Kurd official urges PKK to withdraw from Iraq's Sinjar

By Idris Okuducu

ERBIL, Iraq

An Iraqi Kurdish official on Friday called on the PKK terrorist organization to withdraw from the Sinjar district in Iraq’s northern Nineveh province.

Addressing the PKK in a tweet, Hemen Hawrami -- a senior advisor to Masoud Barzani, president of northern Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region -- said: “You have delivered Aleppo’s city of Manbij to the Syrian regime… why don’t you withdraw from Sinjar?”

Hawrami went on to say that the PKK on Friday had attacked a number of Syrian Peshmerga fighters as they crossed through the village of Khan Sour near Sinjar.

The PKK, however, were unable to stop Peshmerga fighters from entering the area, Hawrami added.

“Syrian Peshmerga had earlier repulsed an attack by the Daesh terrorist group on the northern city of Ain al-Arab [also known as Kobani] and expelled the militants,” he said. “The PKK, therefore, should withdraw from Sinjar.”

In a related development, four Syrian Peshmerga fighters and three PKK terrorists were injured near Sinjar when clashes erupted between the two sides on Friday.

In mid-2014, the PKK established a presence in Sinjar on the pretext of fighting Daesh, which retained control over the district until being expelled in late 2015.

A number of Syrian Peshmerga fighters fled to northern Iraq’s Kurdish region after Syrian regime forces wrested control over their respective areas in Syria.

Many have since returned, however, after receiving military training from U.S.-led coalition forces in northern Iraq.